Help:Shortened footnotes
Shortened footnotes are a hybrid of standard and Harvard-style parenthetical referencing. They use in-text citations that link to a shortened reference in a list with a separate reference list with full citations to the source. The shortened reference may link to the full reference. Shortened footnotes are used for several reasons: they allow the editor to cite many different pages of the same source without having to copy the entire citation; they avoid the inevitable clutter when citations are inserted into the source text; they bring together all the full citations into a coherent block of markup rather than being strewn throughout the text which allows the list to be alphabetized and makes it easier to edit all the full citations at once. Please read first, as this guide builds upon the methods described there. Overview In this short example, note that an in-text cite such as links to the shortened citation in the Notes list, which in turn links to the long citation in the References list: Then it becomes much thicker in the middle. The Norwegian Blue Parrot will not move if its feet are nailed to the perch. Its metabolic processes are a matter of interest only to historians. Notes References * * |The brontosaurus is thin at one end. Then it becomes much thicker in the middle. The Norwegian Blue Parrot will not move if its feet are nailed to the perch. Its metabolic processes are a matter of interest only to historians. * * }} The browser back button or the backspace key can be used to navigate back. In-text cite The in-text cite can be created using standard tags containing the shortened citation, but this will not link to the long citation: |Elk 1972, p. 5. }} You can manually create a link to the long citation: |Elk 1972, p.5. }} Using the template allows linking with simplified markup and has parameters to include page numbers: | }} The template places the date in parenthesis: | }} The template supports the inclusion of multiple sources in a single footnote. | }} Before was developed, or a similar template was used in tags: | }} :This method is still in place in many articles. Templates in this series include , , , , and : the differences are in the use of parenthesis and colons; see . The link is normally created from the authors' last names and the year of publication. Notes list The Notes list is created by using . When only shortened footnotes are used, then will show the list in an appropriate number of columns. Where shortened and long footnotes are mixed, use . References list Citations in the References list are usually created with a citation template. When linking is desired between the shortened and long citations, the citation template must create an anchor. When using , an anchor is always created. When using one of the templates, the anchor must be enabled using the parameter. By setting the anchor is automatically created from the author last name and the year of publication: : In many cases, there is no author, therefore the link and anchor must be created in a different manner. For example: : Here the in-text cite can be created as: : And the anchor for the citation created with : : }} Formatting The reference list is formatted by placing the citations in an unordered list using the * markup. Entries may be sorted by the author's last name. The text size may be formatted with and . The references list is normally displayed in one column with no indenting. : :* : Date The in-text cite should include only the year. The full citation may include the year only or the full date. Most citation templates will extract the year from a full date to form the anchor. If both a date and a year are included, then the date is displayed, but the anchor is formed from the year. If an author has multiple works in the same year, regardless of whether is a full date or only a year, then duplicate anchors will be generated. To resolve this, suffix the year with an alpha character. For example: * * No author Some sources do not have a single author with a last name, such as a magazine article or a report from a government institution. Options include: * For a newspaper or periodical, use the name of the publication and the date, or set the author parameter to "publication name staff". * For a publication by an institution, use the name of the institution. * Some style guides recommend using the title of the article (title-date). * Other style guides recommend using "Anonymous" or "Anon." Explanatory notes Explanatory or content notes are used to add explanations, comments or other additional information relating to the main content. One of the reasons they may be used is to avoid making the text too long or awkward to read. Such notes may include supporting references. Shortened footnotes mixed with explanatory notes This section uses and . But the Moon is not so big. }} The Sun is also quite hot. Notes References |The Sun is pretty big. But the Moon is not so big. }} The Sun is also quite hot. * * * * }} Shortened footnotes with separate explanatory notes This example creates a separate notes section by using and . Citations References * Brown, The Moon, Penguin. 2001. * Miller, The Sun, Oxford, 2005. * Smith, The Universe, Random House, 2005. |The Sun is pretty big. But the Moon is not so big. The Sun is also quite hot. * Brown, The Moon, Penguin. 2001. * Miller, The Sun, Oxford, 2005. * Smith, The Universe, Random House, 2005. }} Shortened footnotes with separate explanatory notes with references This method uses to create the main footnotes, to create the explanatory notes and to create footnotes in the explanatory notes. }} But the Moon }} is not so big. The Sun is also quite hot. Notes Citations References * * * |The Sun is pretty big. }} But the Moon }} is not so big. The Sun is also quite hot. * * * }} This method uses to create the main footnotes, to create the explanatory notes, to create footnotes in the explanatory notes and to create the notes list. }} But the Moon }} is not so big. The Sun is also quite hot. Notes Citations References * * * |The Sun is pretty big. }} But the Moon }} is not so big. The Sun is also quite hot. * * * }} Citations Citations may be formatted manually or by use of templates. See the Wikipedia referencing navbox below for various citation styles. When using template, must be set, usually to . See the for details. Errors Errors involving tags will be automatically displayed in article, user, template, category, help and file pages. To show error messages on talk and other pages, see . It is very possible to create an in-text cite that does not link to the full citation and to create full citations that do not have a matching in-text cite. Often the link and anchor may not match for some reason. To catch these errors, use the User:Ucucha/HarvErrors script. When an in-text cite does not have a matching full citation and cannot be readily resolved, then it can be tagged with . It is also possible to create duplicate ids for the in-text cite, resulting in invalid HTML. See for help in validating and resolving issues. Examples These articles exemplify the use of shortened footnotes: * ; uses manually crafted short citations in tags * ; uses These articles illustrate improperly implemented shortened footnotes: * :The article uses (#10, 11, 12) to point to Rothenburg1976, which is a manually defined citation with no anchor (#9); the footnotes and shortened footnotes are mixed. sfn template use notes } and variant templates form the link from the author last name and the year. Up to four authors are supported, for example, . The full citation must create an anchor that matches the link. templates use to create the anchor; always creates the anchor. An "anchor" is a landing place for a link to jump to. It is automatically created by/from certain parameters in the full citation template. If there is a need to cite two works by the same author published in the same year see more than one work in a year for advice on what to do. See also *Wikipedia:Citation templates and reference anchors Notes Category:Footnote templates